Hallow the Vessels
by quietpagan
Summary: The Kraang never came for April. Instead they watched and waited, biding their time and keeping a much closer eye on those effected by their mutagen. But they underestimated the threat offered by a pissed-off teenage girl, a giant alligator, and three turtles who just want their brother back. Rated T for language and possible gore.
1. Chapter 1

Takes place sometime around 'Metalhead Rewired'.

* * *

After the escape and massacre caused by their second-favorite experiment, the Kraang were significantly more careful about the substance known as mutagen and the uses it was put to. It was not, they concluded after an investigation of the incident, a good idea to conduct their experiments without first making sure that the subject's mind was either broken or erased completely. They also agreed that observation was as useful as direct experimentation; seeing the subjects in their environments, how they interacted with the dominant species of the planet and with each other, was as vital as information as anything. And after the incident with their experiment, they decided to keep a much closer eye on their mutagen; their second-favorite experiment had turned out to be an terrifying threat, mostly due to their interference with its physiology and brain function and the _incredible_ grudge it held against them for it. Within the past fifteen years, the investigation found, more than four canisters had been missing or broken on the planet Earth. Within the last few years, owing to careless handling in their partnership with various human operations, many more were misplaced.

The Kraang did not lose track of these canisters – recently all mutagen containers were equipped with a tracking device – but watched carefully as various humans and animals on the planet were very interestingly mutated. They kept careful tabs and files on every subject, studying biology, physical strengths and weaknesses, and mental capacities, observing from afar what exactly their mutagen could do in this strange, unpredictable dimension.

And the results were promising.

Many of the mutations were haphazard, inelegant – a gruesome mashing-up of parts and traits from the creatures combined by the mutagen: the creatures known as Squirrelanoids and the snakehead mutant formerly known as Xever Montes, currently known as Fishface, to name a few. The Kraang were especially interested in the mutant formerly known as Christopher Bradford, formerly known as Dogpound, currently known as Rahzar; his double mutation had had the Kraang scientists buzzing for weeks as they observed a complete lack of disintegrating mental capacities and a wonderfully, curiously stable mutation. After the human known as Shredder traded him for weapons, he became their third favorite experiment.

But although a few subjects didn't take very well with the creatures they were forcibly matched to, most of those affected had designs that were almost beautiful in the seamless melding of DNA:

The rat mutant formerly known as Hamato Yoshi, currently known as Splinter;

The turtle mutants known as Michelangelo, Donatello, Raphael, and Leonardo;

The tiger mutant known as Tigerclaw;

The gecko mutant known as Jason Mortello;

All and more exhibited completely stable mutations, with streamlined designs and sane, intelligent minds. The Kraang watched these more carefully, trying to discover what exactly caused these particular subjects to mutate so perfectly. The physical laws of Dimension X and Earth differed so greatly that the mutagen's effects were wildly unpredictable on Earth; what, then, caused these flawless mutations?

They hypothesized that certain blood types would cause stable or unstable mutations, based on the samples they had acquired from various blood banks around the planet. Unfortunately, they could never know for certain without directly experimenting on the subjects themselves.

A decision which, happily, coincided with their invasion plans of the planet Earth.

The mutants had established a heavy network of connections and communications, so the Kraang had to work quickly and quietly to acquire their subjects without alerting the rest. Those without powerful connections were taken first:

The spider mutant formerly known as Vic Shwartz, currently known as Spiderbytez;

The pigeon mutant known as Pigeon Pete, another escapee of theirs;

The chimpanzee mutant known as Tyler Rockwell, created by one of their agents on Earth.

After they allied themselves with the criminal organization known as the Foot Clan, they had significantly easier and faster access to mutants. The Foot was adept at capturing mutants and gave them to the Kraang in exchange for advanced weaponry, or what they _thought_ was advanced weaponry; human technology was so simple in comparison that the Shredder was happy with mere plasma cannons. Their partnership even led to the eventual capture of the mutant turtle known as Michelangelo, thereby destroying one of the many obstacles in the way of Kraang Prime's plans.

As their plans progressed, the Kraang acquired more powerful mutants: the tortoise mutant known as Slash; the incredible _garbage_ mutant formerly known as Henry Wright, currently known as Muckman. _His_ psychic abilities were almost exactly what the Kraang were looking for, and his mutation was unique among the others, having drawn material from several different organic and inorganic substances. The cockroach mutant with bio-mechanical limbs paled in comparison.

But none of their captured mutants were nearly as important as their favorite experiment, the experiment they had cultivated through tens of dozens of Earth years, their pillar of perfectly-molded DNA and finely-tuned mental abilities that would allow them to develop a strain of mutagen stable on Earth _and_ control those affected by it. The capture of their favorite experiment was surprisingly difficult; once she caught on to the fact that she was being hunted, she was adept at hiding and evading them – her developing abilities, attuned as they were to both the Kraang and the universe she resided in, no doubt aided her, but eventually the Kraang's human allies delivered her to their ship.

And their final plans could begin.

She was their singular specimen, their only chance – and they could not waste it by simply draining all her powers and disposing of her. They discovered that she had developed a way to listen to the Hive Mind, and so were incredibly careful about what they said or even thought in her proximity. They implanted her with trackers and monitors just as they had the others, measuring synaptic responses to pain and other stimuli. They recorded her vitals and her physical responses, noting a slight accelerated healing rate but few other physical manifestations of her mutation. Quietly, unobtrusively, they monitored her mental abilities from afar.

Her ability to tune into the Hive Mind was disturbing, but not unprecedented; they had programmed that, and it simply manifested earlier than they had planned. She seemed to have a slight sense of emotion, and with a little tweaking possible telekinetic abilities, but the Kraang decided to hold off on _that_ experiment until they knew for sure exactly how much damage she could cause. Once, in a careless underestimation of her abilities, they had attempted to drill into her head to directly examine her brain matter; she had become distressed and psychically destroyed both their drill and the Kraang controlling it. Fortunately she did not remember the incident, but the Kraang were significantly more cautious after that. Until they could figure out the full extent of her powers and harness them, she needed to be kept as calm and as unknowing of their true plans as possible.

The Kraang had everything worked out, in every detail of code and sequence; they had plans for every eventuality, every roadblock and mishap possible. They had drills for emergencies, plans of action for unruly test subjects, and backups for the backups of every system on their ship.

But for all their planning, they had a hubris that they did not realize was dangerous, and in this pride they did not stop to consider that it possibly was a bad idea to give untested powers to a teenage girl with a grudge, and then _experiment_ on her. While they were concealing their intentions from her, _she_ in turn was hiding her own plans.

Two months into the capture of April O'Neil, the Kraang entered the lab specially set up for her only to find her gone from her cell unit. Their monitoring equipment showed nothing and had obviously been tampered with; the tiny glitches and small anomalies noted within the past weeks suddenly came to light as O'Neils experiments, until she was able to mentally connect herself to the machines and sabotage them. The trackers they had installed into her only gave her location as somewhere around on their ship, and they searched every room, hallway, closet, even the ventilation system without a trace.

Kraang Prime was contacted just as the tracker suddenly moved, away from the ship at startling speed, and the Kraang were unable to prevent their favorite experiment from falling directly into the river they hovered over. They watched in increasing horror as her vitals monitor went insane, and then flat-lined. Their favorite experiment had drowned.

* * *

April O'Neil, as a rule, ran more towards anger than despair when things turned to shit. Her mother died? Anger. Her father never came home from the grocery store? Anger. Creepy guys in suits chased her around town? Anger. Creepy _ninjas_ kidnapped her and gave to the guys in suits, who turned out to be aliens with their brains in their chests and wanted to experiment on her?

Damn, she was _pissed._

It didn't really do much – apparently the _Kraang_ , as they referred to themselves, were quite prepared to put up with an enraged teenager, but once April discovered that she could do stuff with her mind she made a plan to escape. It took a while; the various experiments that they put her through occupied her for a long time: physical exams of endurance and healing, surgical implantations, pain tests…all time- and- energy consuming, until April was left aching and exhausted, almost too tired and hurt to really get angry.

The Kraang were very careful around her, she learned, and as the weeks went by (she assumed. Time didn't really have a whole lot of meaning in the lab) she discovered that their thoughts were open to her. They had the same realation and closed their minds as best they could, but not before April got a glimpse into their plans. Something about using her powers to take over the planet, or whatever.

It marked the moment that she got really serious about escaping. She'd initially shied away from the powers the Kraang were forcing her to discover, but now she quietly began to use them, expanding them without the Kraang noticing.

She surreptitiously searched through their minds, but her range was limited to the Kraang working on her directly, and she found nothing. So she turned her attention to their machines. It took a while, especially since she had to be _so_ careful, but eventually she was able to mentally tap into their computer system.

She learned that they had been watching her for a very, very long time.

She learned that she wasn't the only one that was being experimented on.

She learned that her birth had not been a happy result of two people falling in love, but the meticulous arrangement of two finely-tuned strains of DNA.

And most importantly, she learned that she could hide from them.

She started small: tiny lines of code suddenly ruined, little glitches that could be put down as accidents. The Kraang didn't notice. She tweaked and tuned her control until she could make the monitors do or show whatever she wanted. And so one night she faked sleep, messed with her trackers, and made the Kraang's monitoring equipment show her to be enjoying a peaceful rest as she broke the codes for her cell and climbed into the ventilation shafts.

They were a little smaller and more cramped than April had seen on tv, but wasn't this how everyone escaped creepy labs and evil lairs? April shuffled through shaft after shaft, the occasional vent her only light as she tried to move toward what she thought was the outside of whatever they were keeping her in. It was a lot bigger than it had looked on the computer

She caught sight of what was going on in the rest of the place through the vents above and below her, not stopping for anything, until she managed to sneak into a crawlspace beneath what she figured to be the very bottom floor.

She saw them then. The experiments. The mutants.

Their pain hit her like a roaring wave, mental screams of agony and helplessness driving into her mind like sledgehammers and knives, until she thought she would burst from the shared pain. She was overwhelmed – her powers lashed out in an attempt to lessen the distress and she distantly heard small explosions and the pig-like shrieking of Kraang, before something twisted beneath her and she dropped through the floor.

She was falling, falling, down down through fresh, cold air that hit her face like needles, and she could barely crack her eyes open to see the river rushing toward her before she fell into its waters.

* * *

Two years have passed. The boys are all seventeen, April eighteen. Most of the events of the show have happened, though under different circumstances and with different timelines since they have not met April yet.

In this AU Snake was never mutated, because the kidnapping of April never happened. The boys just enjoyed a quiet first time above ground, and returned home without incident. Leonardo was chosen as leader of the team some time later, when they began to have conflict with the Foot and, through their partnership with Shredder, the Kraang.

The quote used for the title is "I find that what your people need is not so much imaginative art but that which hallows the vessels of everyday use." By Oscar Wilde. It's actually from a wabi sabi book I have, but I like the idea of appreciating things that are useful and but necessarily beautiful. This applies to people as well.


	2. Chapter 2

The water hit her like a punch to the whole body, hard and fast before she even had time to take a breath, and before she could even feel panic she was sinking.

Her father had never insisted that April take swimming lessons, and since they rarely went to the beach anyway, learning to swim had never been top of the list of April's priorities. Making good grades. Acing PE. Not thinking about Mom. Those were things she thought were useful, and important.

Her former priorities now seriously _sucked_ , because April realized that she was drowning.

It came with a sudden flurry of panic and calm; there was nothing she could do about it, but at the same time _there was nothing she could do about it_. She actually was going to die, now, right now. The river was going to swallow her and she would become one of those myriad horrible bodies discovered when the police department dredged the river every year. Maybe they'd even be able to identify her and give her remains to her aunt, bury her next to her mom's empty grave. These were the calm thoughts. They came in a split-second, to be quickly drowned out by a siren wail of _I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to die!_

The _panicked_ thoughts were slower and drenched her insides with despair and hopelessness. Her head was swimming, aching, her eyes clenched with the force of the pressure around her. There was no probability of her surviving, and she actually was going to die. She'd never felt more sure of anything in that moment, the slow, shaking moment when she had to blow out her last breath, and her shrieking core forced her to inhale.

Something hit her hard then, something fast and rough and _painful,_ forcing her to empty her mouth of the fetid water as it dragged her through. Her waist was clutched too tightly and she felt her bones bending, almost equal to the pain in her lungs, but in less than a few seconds she was thrown from the water and dragged onto something hard and cold, while a meaty block pushed down on her abdomen and forced her to cough up the river that she had swallowed.

The first breath of air was beautiful and as agonizing as a sword-wound, sharp and watery, and April coughed and vomited until her lungs were on fire and her vision swam with red and black. Her head was pounding with the drumbeats of hell, but above the din she could hear a soft slithering, the slide of scale on concrete. The warmth of a body entered her space and she jumped on it, curling herself as best she could over the thing that had saved her from the river. A breath of warm air puffed over her back where her shirt had torn, and it was so _alive_.

A shivering had taken hold of her limbs, not only because of the cold but because of the _fear_ , and she clutched to the unknown savior as tightly as she could manage. It was rough enough to tear at her hands and face, large enough to crush her entire body, but she pressed herself closer and began to sob. But for a split second, she would have died. But for whatever the thing was, she would have died. April didn't give a _fuck_ what the hell it was, and simply cried and shivered until she fell into an exhausted sleep.

* * *

Her head was still aching when she woke up, and by the pain in her body she estimated that she had not been out for more than a few hours. It took her a moment to remember what had happened, but when she did, it hurt. The fear and the despair of knowing hit her like an axe, and she began to cry again, even though it made her head throb more.

The thing beneath her stirred, woken by her shaking breaths. Something sharp prickled against her back where a wide, flat palm lay, and roughness scraped her cheek.

"No more of that," a harsh, rumbling voice said. It echoed wherever they were, and April could feel the vibrations in its chest. "You are safe now."

She opened her eyes, but the darkness was complete; only moonlight shone off of a small opening to the river, not nearly enough to illuminate the thing that had saved her. Whatever it was, it was huge, and strong. The arm that wrapped around her torso was at least the width of April's entire body, and the hand covering her back stretched from the nape of her neck down to her the waistband of her pants.

"Where-"

Her throat immediately burned, scraped raw with water and coughing fits, and she instinctively curled into herself as she gasped. The thing – creature – whatever – let her go and she fell to her knees and threw up again, nothing but spit and burning bile. The creature slithered away from her for a moment then came back; something soft and cottony was pushed against her arm, and she wiped her face with it, shivering again. A blanket or something was tugged over her shoulders and quickly clutched over her cold shoulders.

"Than-thank you," April rasped. Something rumbled high above her.

"There is no need," the creature said. April took a wild guess and decided it was male.

Something prodded her abdomen and chest and April hissed with the sudden stinging. She reached up and felt where the pain was; the sites where her trackers and monitor were implanted seemed open and inflamed.

"You are injured," said the creature. "I do not have what you need to heal."

"All I need is a knife," April said. The whole horror of almost drowning was pushed to the side with the _new_ horror of still having her Kraang implants inside of her. "A knife," she said more urgently. "I need a knife now!"  
"You should not – "  
"They're _trackers_ ," she hissed, stumbling to her feet and pushing against him. "I have to get them out, now!"

"I know someone who may be able to-"  
" _Now!"_

The creature pulled away from her and she heard it thump away, its footsteps echoing as if in a long tunnel. She summoned her strength and walked forward on unsteady feet, following the sounds of a heavy body and a…dragging tail? until it turned around and gently picked her up. She itched during the minutes it took for the creature to take her to wherever it was going, a monstrous agitation to get the invasive things out of her skin.

Finally they stopped as the air changed sound and the place they were in seemed larger, with a different kind of smell and a different kind of dark. The creature pressed her tightly to his chest and maneuvered strangely, stepping sideways and sometimes backwards, crouching and stretching at odd intervals. At length, a scrape of metal sheared through the darkness, and a light flickered on.

The thing holding her softly set her down on a large pile of ratty cloth, and a knife-blade appeared in her vision. She snatched it up, ignoring the immense greyish shape that stood in her peripheral vision, and dug the blade into her abdomen before she could convince herself not to.

The pain brought back memories, bad memories, of the same kind of cruel surgery in a much more horrifying place, and she had to pause while her hands shook.

" _Please_ ," said the creature behind her. "Allow me to help you!"

April nodded but kept digging. Her teeth clenched and tears blurred her vision until she could only work by feel, but eventually – after what felt like an eternity – the tip of the knife scraped against something small and hard, and April used a swell of anger to force the blade in further and flick the little tracker out of her body. It _pinged_ on the floor, and she crushed it with the pommel of the blade.

"Okay," she panted. Tears were soaking her hair and chin but she shakily handed the knife to the creature. " _Now_ you can do it."

* * *

Taking out the trackers and the monitor took a good hour. Her savior worked swiftly and efficiently, cutting out the devices where they had imploded in her skin, but he was still uncertain about hurting her to do so. It wasn't sanitary, it wasn't even a good idea, but April knew she wouldn't be able to do anything before knowing that each and every one of the things was out of her body and destroyed. The pain was incredible, a rival to the agony of the initial implantations, but she shut her eyes and clenched her teeth and tried to think of absolutely anything but those pink blobby bastards and the straps that had held her to the tables. She could feel her powers trying to escape, searching for something to attack to make the pain stop, and she heavily stomped down on them, thinking with a manic fervor of flowers and sunshine and the hot dogs sold in Central Park. The carousel with the jeweled horses – _the Kraang arguing over her vital signs –_ the stupid little jars her dad stored rice and beans in – _the itching pressure of the Hive Mind, a hundred thousand voices talking of many things and the same thing –_ the little sunny lake where she and her dad could catch frogs – _the screaming of dozens of twisted monsters, all calling out HELP ME, HELP ME, BROTHERS PLEASE SAVE ME –_

Her palms stung suddenly as the creature grabbed her hands and smacked them several times against the floor. She hadn't realized she had been gasping.

"Focus on where you are _now_ ," he said, rubbing her hands back and forth against the textured metal. "Not where you were. What do you smell?"  
April smelled candles, and lamp oil, and the warm scent of burnt dust. She smelled metal and a hint of sewage, and the sharp tang of loneliness and rage. There was damp and earth and…pigeons…?

He drew forth the last monitor then, from the spot below her collarbone. The blood was a cloying scent, heady and nauseating, but she breathed a sigh of relief when came the sound of the device being irreparably crushed.

"Thank you," April whispered, for both the removal and the grounding. The creature pressed a cloth to her wounds and rumbled.

"Will you allow me _now_ to take you to someone who can further help you? There is not much that I can offer you here," he said. April nodded and pushed herself onto her elbows. Cracking her eyes open, she got her first real glance at her savior.

Honestly, she wanted to scream. But her throat still hurt and he looked so…mild, lit with soft candlelight and deep shadow, sitting in an abandoned subway car with a handmade alligator toy and claws smeared in her own blood. She noticed the wounds on him, too, the puckered scars of holes dug deep, scratch-marks and laser burns and rivets drilled into his hide.

The heavily-notated files of the Kraang's second-favorite experiment swam through her mind, and she smiled at him.

"My name's April," she said. "Let's go see your friend."

* * *

Ow, yeah, Leatherhead in the house. I love Leatherhead, he's my favorite, like a big cuddle toy made of teeth and angst. I kind of just want to give him a hug and tell him that everything's going to be alright. Somebody protect this big beautiful boy.

I made April a little more hard-core, but let's face it, she's pretty hard-core in whatever she's in. 1987? Only reporter not to flee when bad guys show up. 1990 film? Makes jokes and draws Raph's sai on ninjas in the subway. 2003? Scientist _and_ ninja in training. 2007? Gives Leo a kick up the ass and badasses her way through ninjas and monsters from another dimension. 2012? Immediately wants to head the search for her dad and refuses to be left behind, also _calls out_ _Splinter_. 2014? Literally stabs Shredder in the back _and_ faces him off once again. 2016? Takes on Karai, steals the purple ooze out of the lab _while Beebop and Rocksteady are violently mutating,_ runs recon for Donnie, uses herself as a shield so the turts don't get shot. But hey, April's just the token girl and totally irrelevant and useless to the show, I guess.

Grounding yourself to your immediate surroundings can be helpful in a panic attack or similar situation; focusing on a specific object in your sight, the smells, what you can hear, etc. It actually was illustrated really well in _Finding Dory_ , when she was scared and lost; she focused on the sand, because she liked sand, sand was squishy – she saw shells, she liked shells – there was water and there was kelp, kelp was better than water, etc. I'm having a minor freak-out at how recent kid's movies are actually addressing things like understanding emotions and racism and mental disabilities and how to understand these things in you and in other people.

If someone just got rescued from drowning and they've coughed or vomited up water, please don't assume that everything's fine. Even if it looks like they got it all out, they may still have water in their lungs and need to be taken to a hospital immediately.

Also, please don't do surgery on yourself or your friends. Bad idea, bros.


	3. Chapter 3

The guy wasn't so much a friend, as her reptilian savior informed her on the journey through the subway system, as an acquaintance. He and his brothers had assisted her savior – who did not have a name, apparently – when he ran into a rough spot with some…with some…

The creature had to stop and brace himself against the wall for that part of the story, breathing heavily and surprisingly animalistically. He didn't use the word _Kraang_ and April got the heavy sense that if anybody did, he'd lose it, so she told him she got the general idea and he continued his story.

The brothers stayed with him until he woke up and helped him tend his wounds, but the following interrogation didn't go so well and he lost control and attacked them. They'd been on a 'you live in the sewers, I live in the sewers, let's leave it at that' agreement until the pink blobby bastards (as April had suggested he call the Kraang – honestly, she just wanted to hear him say it) showed up again. They fought together that time, and left on better terms, but still stayed a respectful distance away from each other.

Until now. The creature – April _really_ needed to find a nick-name for him – could not completely fix her up, but apparently some kid with the most pretentious name _ever_ could.

April's anger and the shock of almost dying had faded into an exhausted chill, so she was much more content to be cradled against her new friend's chest as he carried her through the tunnels. Despite her dislike of ever having to lean on anyone, some of her wounds were still bleeding sluggishly and she honestly wasn't sure about how well her legs would hold her. Plus, he was like ten feet tall and had hands larger than her face, she was sure she wasn't heavy to him at _all_.

There was one point where they needed to go underwater, and April almost faltered. The idea of being submerged again, with the water pressing her from all sides and her lungs burning for that last gulp of air, was almost more unappealing than the thought of finding herself back on the Kraang ship, but she curled her face into the creature's chest and nodded her ascent. He swam very quickly, enough that she didn't even have time to worry about running out of air, but still she shook for a solid ten minutes after that. He didn't speak but crooned something soft, and April calmed down to the vibrations against her back.

Twenty minutes in he stopped and sniffed before making a sudden turn and then doing the same a little later, and April wondered if he actually had a clue where they were going. Was he honestly tracking these guys down by _smell_?

Eventually a light grew at the end of the tunnel, so evidently he _was_ , and it actually _worked_. April quietly decided to go over whatever notes she remembered about his project. Or perhaps just ask him. But he seemed kind of touchy on the subject.

A flicker of something brushed her senses and she realized that they had tripped a silent sensor alarm, which, after seeing her friend's rather archaic duct-taped and candlelit home, was a bit disquieting.

"Turtles!" her friend called out. "I need your help, please."  
 _Turtles?_

April knew she wasn't one to judge, since the guy she was clinging to was a giant fucking alligator, but seriously – _turtles?_

Her friend hopped onto a platform and they peered over a bank of rusty turnstiles.

Turtles and a _rat_ , apparently. Not quite as impressive as her new friend with the teeth, but still. Pretty impressive. They stood in a row, carrying swords and shit as if defending their home from intruders.

They all glared at April and her friend and she jumped down from the alligator's arms, staring right back at them. She refused to be cowed, after all she had been through. The emotions that she sensed were to be expected: protectiveness, distrust, wariness, curiosity…there was the strange hint of attraction, too, but it was quickly pushed away as focus was locked on her and her wounds.

"You have brought a stranger to our home," said the rat, with some sort of accent. "I have told you before not to put my family into further danger. Why have you brought this…young lady here?"

"We may not be friends," said April's alligator in his slow, harsh voice. "But I ask you to please help us. She has also been the victim of…of Those Pink Blobby Bastards."

She was right; it was hilarious. The turtles all cracked a grin and even the rat in the maroon bathrobe relaxed a bit.

"I cannot tend her wounds further," continued April's friend. "I don't have the skills or the supplies."

"How do we know that we can even _trust_ her?" demanded the bulkiest turtle, the one with the red eye-mask. "Actually, how do we know we can trust _you?_ The last time we met you swung Donnie around by his face!"  
April looked up at her savior, who shrank a little.

"He just saved my life," she said, looking back at the turtle who had spoken and meeting him glare-for-glare.

"So? Why does your word count for anything? I bet the minute you get back to the surface you're going to start telling people about us."

 _What a little shit._

The turtle in blue turned to his argumentative brother.

"Raph, look at her," he said. "She's not screaming, she's not freaking out or trying to record us or anything – "

"Exactly," said the one called Raph. If his name turned out to be something as snooty as 'Raphael' April was going to laugh.

"She's way too calm about meeting four _talking turtles_ and a _giant rat_. Something's either really wrong with her, or she's used to mutants. And the only mutants we _know_ are bad guys!"  
"Raphael," said the rat sternly. April laughed. He looked back at her and studied her for a minute. _Nice try, rat guy_ , she thought to herself _, but you can't actually read minds. I would know._

At length he said: "You may enter. Our home is open to you, as long as you care for it. But…"

He pointed his staff at April's new friend. "If you or she puts my family in danger, the consequences will be quite severe."

"We're _ninjas_ ," hissed the rude turtle in red, when April raised a disbelieving eyebrow. She continued to be completely unimpressed.

"So? I have an attack alligator."

"Can we maybe do this somewhere where the girl's not _dripping blood_ on the living room," said the tallest turtle.

April looked down and saw a nice watercolor of red running down her damp shirt and pants, making a little smear around her feet.

 _Oh, yeah_ , she remembered. _Blood loss._

Her savior grabbed her shoulder before she could sway too badly; the rat gently tapped the tall turtle with his staff.

"Donatello, will you please assist this young lady?"

"Right! Uh, could you bring her into the lab," said the turtle to April's friend.

The word struck April like a slap to the face, a reaction she had not been expecting. She forced herself to focus on her friend's rumbling breaths, the smells of pizza and teenage boy and the annoying sound of a pinball machine. Her feet moved with a will of their own, and she tensely marched herself through the gap in the turtle-wall, feeling three pairs of unfamiliar eyes on her still-damp back as she and her friend followed the tall turtle down a hallway.

 _They all can kiss my ass_ , she thought, as indignation swirled through a couple of them and nausea swam through her.

The lab turned out to be more of a nerd's nightmare than the stark medical ward she was used to, the walls covered in posters and taped-up notes, every surface featuring its own mishmash of science equipment. April gingerly sat herself down on a much-mended futon, regretting her earlier bravado in choosing to stomp down the hallway. Her head was swimming from the effort, and the wounds in her abdomen ached and stung with river water and sweat. She grimaced at the thought of the infections she was surely going to get.

As the tall turtle took instruments and bottles out of a wall cabinet, April became aware of an angry conversation just outside the door.

" _We're really just going to leave them alone in there with Donnie? You saw what happened last time. And what's with the chick?"_

" _Sensei said it was fine."  
"Sensei didn't see him grab Donnie by the face-!"_

"I wanna hear that story," April muttered. The tall turtle – obviously Donnie, or Donatello as her friend had referred to him – set an armful of medical crap down on a rolling table and grimaced at her.

"No, you really don't," he said. "It's not a very fun – ahh!"

He suddenly noticed April's alligator standing just behind him and immediately jumped to the other side of the futon.

"Uh, heh heh. Heyyyy…"  
"I am not here to fight, Donatello," said April's friend, looking oddly chagrined. "I merely would like to watch."  
The turtle boy didn't look very mollified. He kept April between him and the alligator, and rolled the little table to his side. April lay back, calmly oozing as he ran his eyes over the bloody spots on her shirt.

"Okay, uh…I'm going to have to…do you mind if…?"  
He suddenly looked much more like a teenage boy than before. April huffed and rolled her eyes, sitting up and taking off her shirt. The Kraang had given her nothing to wear beneath the weird white pajamas they'd put her in, but she'd been poked and prodded, stripped and sprayed with funky chemicals enough that 'naked' was just a word by now. Donatello hastily looked up at the ceiling until something more focused and professional shuttered over his eyes, and he set to work without awkwardness.

April appreciated the time he took to allow local anesthetic to set in; she'd had just about enough of surgery _without_ it. She didn't watch, but lay back and let him work, only feeling the occasional twinge or unpleasant pressure as he disinfected the holes she and her friend had gouged into her body and then sewed them up. She was distantly aware of two other presences at the door, but then decided that she didn't care; right now she'd walk through Times Square butt naked if it meant getting competent medical treatment, and the turtle seemed to have a pretty good idea of what he was doing. April wondered how he'd come to know about so much medical stuff, before she realized that he and his family couldn't exactly go to the hospital if one of them broke an arm or got an infection.

At some point in time she must have dozed off, because when she opened her eyes again the lab was darker and someone had covered her with a blanket. Her friend was running his claws through her hair as it hung over the back of the futon, and it was so relaxing that she was tempted to just go back to sleep. A quick mental search told her that the turtles and the giant rat were in another room, and with some subtle shifting she discovered the stiff presence of bandages wound over her entire torso and abdomen.

The claws paused.

"How are you feeling," her friend asked. April sat up with his help and pulled her legs over the side of the futon.

"I'm actually pretty good," she said. "As long as I don't get an infection I should be fine. I mean, we're in the _sewers_ , but…"

April suddenly giggled. She hadn't had a decent chance to simply feel _happy_ about escaping the Kraang, and now she was relieved of her trackers, healed up, and in the presence of a new friend who she knew without a doubt would protect her at all costs. She felt safe for the first time in who knew how long, and finally she could relax.

"Alligators in the sewers," she muttered cheerfully. "I don't know why that didn't occur to me earlier. Are you the only one down here, or is that actually _not_ just an urban legend?"

Her friend helped her sit up and drink what she hoped was water from the glass on the rolling table.

"I have lived here less than a year," he rumbled, an adorable if toothy smile on his face. "But I have encountered none of my own kind, or what was _previously_ my own kind."  
"Maybe the Kraang got them, too," said April carelessly. "Oh, shit."

April was able to calm him down without making too much of a mess in the lab, but couldn't help the turtles and their incongruous rat-dad seeing her chill him out with some telepathic vibes. She ignored them for the moment, focusing on gingerly rubbing her hands on the huge alligator's temples and trying not to get her arms chewed on, as she ventured through his head to look for the 'OFF' button.

His mind was surprisingly organized, but it was organized into two parts: Chill-Out Alligator, and Crazy Kraang-Eating Alligator. The second part had been triggered by April's thoughtlessness, a sort of defensive mindset that made everything and everyone look like a threat and locked away his emotions and reasoning until he would do whatever it took to get himself out of the situation that triggered him and into to a safe place.

Trying to navigate through her new friend's head without damaging him or being too intrusive was very difficult; April had never done anything like it before, not outside of the Hive Mind. Kraang minds were completely alien to her, but she had been able to navigate instinctively. The alligator before her only had a similar structure; otherwise, she was on her own.

His 'OFF' button turned out to be anything that made him feel safe: swing music (which didn't exist in Dimension X), candlelight (which didn't exist in Dimension X) and now the feeling of someone gently petting his face (which _certainly_ didn't exist in Dimension X). He'd lived in the Kraang's laboratory his entire life; anything that _wasn't_ Kraang was good.

He calmed down with relative ease after that, and opened his eyes within a few minutes. The turtle boys were still peeking around the door, half-hidden by the rat, and April's alligator began to look very guilty.

"I am sorry," he rumbled slowly. "I – "

"Yeah, that was my fault," April interrupted. "Sorry, I forgot about that trigger. I shouldn't have been so careless."

He started to object and she booped him on the snout to shut him up.

"You guys got anything to eat?" April said to the turtles to change the subject. "Because I've been living on a mush diet for…actually, what day is it?"

"August twentieth," said Donatello.

 _Holy shit._ She'd been gone for over two months?

"We're not feeding you," said the grumpy turtle, Raphael. The one in blue smacked him on the arm. "What? He freaked out again!"  
"But no one was harmed," said the rat, with a warning look to his asshole kid. "If you wish, you may stay for dinner."

Raphael almost blew a gasket, but silently. He still gave April a shit look when she followed the rat out of the lab, trailing her alligator by the claw, but she gave him one back and flounced as well as her injuries would allow while they ventured to the kitchen.

As they walked, April took stock of the place they were in. Obviously a ghost station, with a sunken area, broken-off staircase, and several halls leading outside of the main room. She wondered about the pool, but then again the majority of the inhabitants were _turtles_ – water probably was as big a thing for them as it was for her alligator friend.

She had a basic, almost background feel for the surprising number of electronics in the place, but she had to concentrate to focus on them. Back on the Kraang ship, mentally connecting with the machines there had felt almost natural, although it took her some practice. Here the connection was automatic, if fainter. Perhaps because she'd grown up around Earth technology.

Her friend paused outside of the kitchen doorway, drawing April's attention away from her tentative attempt to hack into the Wi-Fi. He withdrew his claws from her hand and gave her a little push when she stepped toward him.

"I believe I have outworn my welcome," he said softly. "It may be better if I exclude myself."

He was smiling when he said it, but April had never felt a more perfect example of 'crying on the inside'. The creature was torn apart with loneliness and the caustic ache of a self-imposed isolation – he was dangerous to others and he knew it, and he refused to allow himself to become part of a group. April could tell that he was about to suggest _she_ cut ties from him, and she Was Not Having That. She'd never felt safer or more cared for than she had in the past two hours, and there was absolutely _no way_ that she was going to let him push her away.

But at the same time, the weird family in the kitchen had heard, and every single one of them had the growing hope that he would leave. April almost insisted that her friend stay, just to get on their nerves, but she really didn't have the energy to orchestrate such a clusterfuck.

"Alright," she said simply. "I'll bring you back a bag, then?"

The alligator looked surprised, but then shook his head.

"It would be better for you to stay here," he rumbled quietly. "There is a dangerous part of me that I _cannot_ control; you have seen it already. I do not want to risk you getting hurt."

April already knew this, but she hadn't known the other reason: he didn't want her to stay _just_ because he could hurt her, but because he also couldn't stand the thought of waking up and _finding out_ that he had hurt her. It was a selfish thought, not wanting to face that kind of guilt, but April couldn't blame him for it. However, she needed to make something clear.

"Thank you for looking out for me," she said politely. "Thank you for saving me and thank you for bringing me here. But if you think that you're just going to dump me with _these_ jerks – " she jerked her thumb over her shoulder, where at least one of the turtles was peeking around the kitchen door.

" – You're dead wrong."

She knew it was a little rude to push him into keeping her, but where else was she supposed to go? Home had been compromised when those Kraang robots had burst through the door, and the city above was too vulnerable for her. She highly doubted that the turtles and their dad would be enthusiastic about being saddled with her, but her alligator friend still held the soft, tinkling hope that she would insist on staying with him despite the danger.

It was cheating, looking into his head, but he knew she could do it and she didn't venture too far.

She insisted.

The little spot of hope grew just a bit brighter.

April's stomach took the opportunity to interrupt the sentimental moment with a loud, crude growl. She looked back at the kitchen, and grimaced.

"But, uh…"

Her alligator smiled knowingly and she felt her face heat up with embarrassment.

"Would you mind if I grabbed some dinner, first?"

* * *

Yeah, spell-check, I know 'animalistically' isn't an actual word, but it just _sounded_ right, so stfu please.

Mikey was taken before the bros met Leatherhead, so their friendship never happened and the others are still distrustful of the _giant fucking PTSD alligator living less than a mile from their home._

Didja see the little reference to the 2016 movie slipped in there?

This will NOT be an April/Leatherhead ship fic, though I may add hints of April/Donatello or perhaps April/Raphael. I just want April and LH to be bros. Adorable, cuddly, ass-kicking bros.


	4. Chapter 4

April had entered the kitchen expecting a can of soup or a power-bar to be shoved in her hand, not a table set with five places (the sixth left out but on the counter, as if in the hope that it wouldn't need to be used). April nearly turned up her nose then and there – she wasn't particularly enthusiastic about dining with a family that so easily snubbed her friend – but she was hungry enough that she was willing to let it slide. Once.

They gave her a slice of re-heated pizza and a glass of cold juice, and she nearly choked on both. After so long on a liquid diet, real food almost made her vomit. She wasn't finished by half but her stomach was already getting cramped and sore, and Donatello took the food away from her.

"Leo, we can't just give someone who's been half-starved this stuff! Her body needs to adjust to a normal diet _slowly_. Too much could actually kill her!"  
The blue-masked turtle looked both offended and worried.

"Well, how was I supposed to know that? What _can_ she eat, then?"  
Donatello bustled around the table like some tall, green mother hen, and placed a coffee mug of tap water and a small bowl of rice in from of April.

"Plain food," he said, "Easy to digest, and small amounts of it. Make sure you don't eat anything too rich or too heavy."  
April, her mouth full of rice, nodded. She ate slower and the family was silent for a while, eating their respective meals and watching her from the corners of their eyes.

"I guess you guys don't have too many guests around here, huh?"  
Donatello – the one most open to talking with her, apparently – chuckled self-consciously and nodded.

"Yes, you would be the first," he said. "I guess this is all pretty weird, huh?"

April shrugged, slowly chewing another bite.

"It was," she said. In the back of her mind, she felt her friend either meditating or dozing lightly in the room behind them. "But things have been weird for months. I don't think that anything could surprise me now."

"So you've seen a lot of mutants?" asked the blue one, Leo. Four pairs of eyes focused on her, and she could feel their unwavering attention. _They must really have not had a lot of luck with humans_ , she thought.

"Not many in the city," she said. They were about to get into territory that she didn't really want to talk about, but…they had helped her, despite their wariness of her friend. And there was something in their focus, a hint of information that they were searching for. She owed them a conversation, at least.

"I…there's a big gang called the Foot Clan," she said, sitting back in her seat with her water clutched against her chest. "They're the ones who found me and gave me to the Pink Blobby Bastards –"

" _Are we really calling them that,"_ murmured Raphael.

" – And they had a few mutants in with them. But there were a lot on the ship."  
"Ship? What ship? The Kra – "

" _Pink Blobby Bastards,"_ April hissed, which made him roll his eyes. The nickname may have been hilarious to hear her friend say, but it also counted as a way to _not make him have a freak-out_. Donatello grimaced, but relented.

"Those…pink blobby bastards…have a ship?"  
April nodded.

"It's invisible, I think. They took me there, and I saw a lot of mutants on the lower levels. It was floating above the East River a few hours ago."

The family all exchanged a glance, their emotions boiling enough for April to feel without even trying. A miasma of hope, fear, worry, and anger fogged the air in the kitchen, heavy as smoke.

"What?"

It was the rat who cleared his throat and answered her.

"We were not always four," he said, slowly, gravely. "Once we were five. My youngest son has been missing for nearly four months. He was captured by the Foot Clan, as you were."  
"What kind of mutants did you see on that ship," asked Leo.

April swallowed and shook her head, trying to remember past the pounding in her chest. The memory of the screams, the smell of blood and fear, the twisted bodies followed by the sudden, heart-stopping fall, made her shiver and shrink into her seat. She knew she was about to have a panic attack and she pressed her fingers into the wounds on her sides, digging them in until the bandages felt wet, but the pain didn't anchor her like she'd hoped it would, it only reminded her that the Kraang still wanted her, that they would catch her again, would install trackers that she couldn't find and even if she got out they'd still find her and bring her back again, she'd never be able to look for her dad and her friend, their second-favorite project, he'd be taken and locked back in the tank they'd raised him in and she'd have to watch…

The black began to fade from April's vision, like static on a TV, when she managed to breathe again. Amid the churning of her horrors she felt something big and warm against her back, curling against her ************/+neck and head, limbs as rough and large as tree-trunks boxing her in. There was a deep rumble that reverberated against her spine and banished the nausea that had curled in her gut, and the shock of a hot breath on the crown of her skull cleared her vision. She was sitting on the floor of the turtle boys' kitchen, the harsh lamps overhead highlighting the confusion and worry on their round faces as well as picking out spots of green and grey on her alligator friend's scales. She was tucked away against his chest with his tail wound in front of her feet and his arms circling her entire body, like a scaly, muscular armor protecting her from everything.

She calmed down enough to feel hugely embarrassed, but the rat-dad entered her vision and crouched in front of them. He glanced briefly at April's friend before placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"I cannot imagine the horrors you have faced, my child," he said. The deep timbre of his voice was soothing after the pig-like squeals that had echoed in April's ears, and the ringing started to clear away. "It is cruel for one so young to have suffered so, and I and my family offer our deepest regrets."

April looked up at the turtles, and for once didn't see anger or distrust in their faces. Even the asshole turtle didn't sneer at her. But the wariness had been replaced by worry, and April remembered the start of the conversation. They had a brother up there.

"I know that this is something you do not care to remember," continued the rat, drawing April's attention again. "But we must know. Did you see anyone like my sons on that ship?"

With her friend's heartbeat against her back, April was calmer, and she thought back to those last moments before falling. Nausea pressed against her throat and she forced herself to concentrate, weaving through what she'd heard and smelled to focus on what she'd _seen._

The rude turtle in red, the asshole Raphael, moved away from his brothers and crouched down beside the rat. He looked down at a photograph held in his hand, and then turned it up toward April.

In the picture Donatello stood with his arm resting on the shoulder of a much smaller turtle, this one wrapped in an orange mask and wearing a grin that looked like sunshine. He had a round face and was making a peace symbol; although with only three fingers it could also have been that 'Live Long and Prosper' thing. The photograph was pushed closer to her face.

"Did you see this kid," asked Raphael.

The eyes were blue, but she didn't need to know that.

 _The same face, floating inside a pink tube. The same face, scrunched in pain as bright pulses of electricity were sent through the glowing fluid. Half unconscious, but still screaming, still chanting, the same painful mantra over and over brothers please save me BROTHERS PLEASE SAVE ME BROTHERS PLEASE SAVE ME_

"Hey!"  
April snapped her head up as Raphael painfully shook her shoulder.  
"Did. You see. This kid?"

April suddenly felt amazingly calm, looking into Raphael's eyes. She glanced at the photograph, and nodded.

"Yes," she said quietly, preparing herself for the shitstorm. "They were electrocuting him."

* * *

The shitstorm turned out to be more of a light shit-shower. Everyone had their own reactions to the news that their family member was on board an invisible Kraang ship, being tortured and experimented on:

The turtle in blue, Leo, left the room. April heard a door shut quietly a little ways down the hall, and then a heavy object smashing onto the floor.

Donatello turned away, fiddling with something on the counter. His mind was a miasma of possibilities and hypothesis, half-imagined sketches of flying machines and weaponry, all mixed up with medical charts and supply lists in an attempt to keep away the despair that leeched around his brain.

The rat sat and talked with them for a while longer, small, meaningless chatter, until he too left the room. April mentally searched for him and found that he was with Leo, who was having difficulty controlling his temper.

And Raphael simply watched. He had removed the photograph from April's face and sat back down, doing nothing but silently looking at her as she curled back into her alligator's embrace. She picked at her food, eating and drinking a little more before pushing the bowl away. He did nothing. His mind was closed to April, a dark, shimmering wall of rage that hid anything else.

She had never thought of her powers as intrusive – they came so naturally to her now that she could hear and feel minds without even trying. The open emotions, the ones that could be read physically, if one had sharp enough eyes, these were the things that she automatically picked up on. But she couldn't feel them in Raphael. It was like looking out a window and finding that someone had built a brick wall just outside of the glass. She wanted to look further, to find the cracks in Raphael's mental wall, but she knew it would be pervasive, intrusive – wrong.

So she sat and studied him as well, until her eyes grew weary from the harsh kitchen lights.

He was shorter than her, but brawny, built with muscle like some miniature Hulk rip-off. His eyes were a more vivid green than his skin, which was littered with small scars. The front of his shell had a jagged chunk missing from the edge, with a corresponding chip gone from the carapace on his back. April could admit that she didn't know much about turtles, but she knew enough to wonder about the strange number of fingers and toes. And what about his brothers? The mutations she had seen had suggested that each individual was different, but Raphael and his brothers all shared the same basic form, varying in individual characteristics but streamlined and similar. Was that why the Kraang had taken the little turtle, to find out why their mutations had turned out so well?

Eventually April's friend asked her to leave, and she exited the ghost station without saying goodbye. Donatello had turned around briefly, looking as though he wanted to say something, but he was cut off when Raphael shoved past him to get out the door, and he didn't try again.

The trip back the way they came was long, since April insisted on walking. Her alligator friend slowly strode beside her, one footstep for each of her three, the sound of his heavy tail dragging on the ground like white noise in the quiet tunnels.

When they came to the underwater part of the journey April considered the possibility that she hadn't exactly thought things through, but who could blame her, what with escaping kidnap, self-surgery, and meeting giant reptiles over the course of the day. The saltwater stung in her wounds and made the bandages bleed pink, and she knew she'd have to see the turtles again the next day, if only to make sure she didn't get an infection.

Once they reached her alligator friend's home April realized another part of her not-plan that she hadn't foreseen: his jury-rigged subway car was barely big enough for _him_ ; setting up a corner for another person made the cramped space even more so. They settled on a compromise where April would hijack a quarter of the blanket nest for the night, and then they'd find somewhere for her to stay in the morning. Or whenever it was that they awoke; in the tunnels, day and night were really not much more than words.

There was the unspoken but considered idea that April might stay with the turtles, and no matter how much she didn't like it she had to admit that it made the most sense. But she'd look around first, she said. Just to be sure there were no other options.

* * *

April awoke to soft candlelight, and scraped the door open just fast enough to vomit up her meager dinner. Sweat was soaking her Kraang-pajamas and the bloodstained bandages on her chest felt stiff and tacky. Once she stopped miserably throwing up she realized how shitty she felt, and knew that she'd gotten an infection. Her friend gently held her hair away from her face and picked her up when her legs shook too badly to stand, and they both knew that she couldn't stay. The feeling was a warm _sadness-acceptance_ in the air, crisp and heavy in April's feverish head. She threw up once again on the way to the turtles' home, and no matter how many blankets her friend had draped her in she could not get warm.

Donatello and the rat were the only ones up when they entered the ghost station. April kind of faded out after an hour or so, but she caught flashes of warm teas and sharp syringe-pricks, and muddled voices swimming through the air in some sort of chant. In her half-lucid state, feelings and thoughts both dulled and exploded, like an abstract painting inside her head. Their worry made _her_ worry; screams turned into squealing Kraang, torn stitches turned into instruments and experiments, until she finally broke the fever and was able to get some real sleep.

* * *

She opened her eyes to Donatello, turned ninety degrees and clicking away on a Frankenstein laptop, bright, nerdy posters indicating that they were in his lab. Several feet behind her was the churning ball of anger that was Raphael's mind. She was laying on something soft, like a carpet, and the tip of a tail twitched across her vision and blocked off half of her line of sight. April shifted her head a few inches, and saw two-inch-long teeth glistening.

 _Oh, it's just my giant alligator cuddling me_ , she thought. The fever was broken, but a little delirium possibly still remained.

Donatello looked up when she weakly wriggled out from her friend's grasp and looked down at the robe she was wearing.

"Oh – good afternoon. Ah, that's Sensei's. Your clothes were…just…well, disgusting, and with your injuries to consider they really weren't sanitary enough. Your, uh, friend helped with that."

April nodded tiredly. The robe was big enough that she could shrug off the top half and let it fall over the belted bottom, and she would have to be careful walking, lest she trip over the trailing edge. She put a hand to her abdomen and winced.

Everything felt sore, even her arms and legs. Her throat was raw and her mouth tasted like last week's lasagna, and her whole body felt bruised and greasy and like she was getting a bad cold.

"Do you have somewhere where I can take a bath or something?"  
Donatello nodded and looked toward Raphael, and that's when April noticed the bandage on his foot.

"What happened to you," she asked, pointing.

"Just your giant alligator friend," said Raphael, "The day wouldn't be complete unless he had a _Hulk-out on Donnie!"_

"It's nothing," Donatello muttered, trying to hide the bandage with his other foot. "It's just a sprain."

"Yeah, well, that _sprain_ would never have happened if they hadn't come back – "  
"Would you please just take her to the bathroom," Donatello snapped, gesturing to the door. Raphael made an exasperated noise but waved his hand to April and stomped out of the room. She followed him down the hallway, ignoring the very rude things he was thinking about her, just before she felt herself fall forward and black out.

* * *

The first thing she thought, when she woke up, _again_ , was that she was extremely sick of being sick. Turned out she not only had an infection from her wounds, but also pneumonia from almost drowning. Donatello got very caustic about the fact that nobody had mentioned her coughing up a quarter of the East River. While she was bedridden he showed her an honest-to-God, extremely salty, and very _long_ PowerPoint presentation on drowning, near-drowning, and the effects of on the respiratory system.

April tried to take refuge in her scary friend, but Donatello wasn't going to be pushed off of the subject until he had completely depleted his store of sarcasm; the alligator got hit with a presentation too, along with a lecture of how to properly treat wounds and how to avoid getting them infected.

By the end of it all April was almost willing to shout ' _Kraang_ ' just to get her friend to eat Donatello, but he gave her soup and water and let her alligator stay in the lab until April was well enough to walk.

By that time, she'd had more time to cautiously explore her powers, which is how she found out that they were planning to use her as bait.

* * *

I was going to have April stay with Leatherhead, but with his location and her wounds, it just wasn't feasible. Maybe later when she's better.

As I said before, don't assume that you or someone else is fine after a near-drowning just because they've vomited or coughed up water. Chances are that they didn't get anything, and could get very sick, so please be responsible and head to a hospital immediately.

Don't worry about Raph being such a dickass, he's only being nasty because his brother's in trouble and April got out of the same place and he has a really hard time getting angry at the right things sometimes. He'll get better when he realizes April can be just as big an assbutt as he.


	5. Chapter 5

In all honesty, it was really just _Raphael_ who wanted to use her as bait, but the thought still stood. They wanted to use April (or politely ask April, in everyone but Raphael's opinion) to get onto the Kraang ship and rescue the fourth turtle.

It was a noble cause, and April could totally understand it – after all, if her dad had been aboard that ship, she'd be down for a little danger. And she really didn't want to leave all of those people up there to be experimented on.

But like _hell_ were they getting her back on that ship.

" _But you're the only one who's escaped!"_  
Wrong, but she wasn't telling them that.

" _But you can get into the computers!"_  
So could Donatello, with a little hacking – he'd done so before, he told her about it.

" _But then we might never have to see you again!"_  
"I could just poke your eyes out," April had replied to _that_ protest. Raphael gave her a feral grin.

"I'd like to see you try."  
"That's kind of against the point – "

" _But you know the layout of the ship!"_  
"I know a _little_ bit," said April. "I don't have the blueprints directly wired into my brain, you know."

" _But the Kr – those alien assholes will trade anything in order to get you back!"_  
"Yes, and then they'll betray you and either kill you or take you back to their ship for a few rounds of _What Happens If Kraang Does This –_ oops."

It was interesting to have an argument about the Kraang while trying to never actually say the name. April had to calm her friend down twice before the rat-dad – named Splinter, of all things – gave the big guy a warm cup of tea and gently shooed him into another room.

"How are you doing that?"

"Doing what?"  
April turned her eyes away from the returning Splinter to look at Leo(nardo? It _had_ to be Leonardo).

"Calming him down like that. Are those pressure points?"  
April realized that he thought she calmed her alligator friend down with the way she pet his head, instead of with her weird Kraang magic. He didn't _know_ about her powers.

"He just needs to know that he's in a safe place," April said. "With _friends."_

Lying, she knew, would not work out well in the long run, especially if she was to stay with them until she recovered, but April couldn't bring herself to utter the words out loud. As much as she used her powers, as much information she gained and as pivotal they were in helping her escape, she still was heavily uncomfortable admitting – even to herself – that she was so very, very different. The knowledge that she shared DNA with those who had kidnapped her made her skin crawl and her stomach clench in angry nausea, and no matter how useful her powers were, they were still proof of how inhuman she actually was.

Her friend she would tell; he knew about her powers already, knew about her capture and understood what she had gone through. She was nervous to tell him about the other bits, though: what if he left her, what if he hated her, because she was – _very_ technically – Kraang?

The turtles didn't have to know _why_ exactly the Kraang wanted her so badly. She could definitely see ' _Hello, I'm April O'Neil and I'm a half-Kraang mutant created for the destruction of the world'_ coming off very badly. They distrusted her enough already, April didn't need them thinking that she was some sort of Kraang spy or something.

"And if we're still on the subject, I'd just like to point out that you don't need _me_ as bait," April said, lightly sipping at her own tea. "The Kraang would be just as happy to have any of you."  
"Yeah, but I don't really _care_ what happens to _y-_ "

"Raphael. That is enough."  
The rat-dad, Splinter, tapped his staff against the floor, ears back as he glared at his asshole kid.

"Sensei, I'm not letting her put any of us in danger-"  
"I never said you should. But just because she holds no place in your heart does not mean that she does not matter."

Splinter waited until Raphael huffed and backed down, and then turned to April.

"Miss O'Neil, you understand that I and my family cannot fully trust you until you are honest with us?"  
April raised her eyebrows.  
"I don't know what you mean."  
"Why would the Kraang capture a normal human girl? Everything they have done has been to work toward the destruction of this city. How do you figure into that plan?"  
 _He was good_ , April realized. Maybe she'd have to re-evaluate whether or not he could actually read minds.

"Either you are lying to us, and have come as a spy, or you are not telling us everything. Yes, I know – " he said, holding up a hand when she began to protest.

" – That we do not need to know every detail of your life. But if you expect us to help you, we need to trust that you will not offer us harm in return."  
 _Well said._

April glanced at the brother's intrigued faces.

"I hate the Kraang as much as you do," she said. "They kidnapped my dad. They…"  
April had to take a deep breath. _Shit_ , this wasn't easy.

"T-they experimented on me. I know for a fact exactly what would happen to _you_ if I told anyone about you, and nobody deserves that."  
She glanced over at Raphael.

"Even _you_."

He gave her the finger and she smirked before looking back at Splinter.

"You helped me even though you don't know me or like my friend; I really appreciate that. I'm not going to do anything to hurt you because I don't _want_ to."

Splinter watched her for a moment, and then straightened up.

"I suppose that is all we can expect," he said quietly. A lukewarm feeling of trust and understanding was building in him, and April felt relieved.

"Great. I just need a safe place to stay until I – "  
"Oh, hell. No. You are _not_ staying with us," exclaimed Raphael, jumping to his feet.

" – Get better and in _exchange_ – "  
"Sensei, you know she's just trouble, right? She'll lead the Kraang right to us – "  
" – I'll help you get your younger brother back."  
Raphael stopped cold, in the middle of any angry gesture at April's face. The other two turtles froze as well, and even the rat seemed abnormally still.

"You… _what_?"  
April tucked her feet underneath her legs and settled back into the corner of the seat.

"I'll help you get your brother back," she said. "I don't want to leave all of those people up there. I never did. And in exchange, you'll let me stay here."  
"Why can't you stay with your alligator friend," said Raphael, although April noticed that he seemed significantly calmer than before; the question had even been more curious than hostile. April simply looked at him, and coughed pointedly.

"I can get rid of that pneumonia," said Donatello quickly, as if he wasn't already. "I can heal your wounds. Hack the Pentagon. Anything you need."  
"Can you really get Mikey back?"  
April looked at Leo, and felt something inside her slip a little bit. She'd forgotten for a moment that these guys were just kids, like she was. Younger, even. The loss of her father felt like a hole in her chest, her mother's disappearance still an unhealed wound. Having their brother be in such danger was a hurt she understood.

"You're not getting me back on that ship," April said, glaring up at Leo. "But I'll help any way I can."

* * *

He listened with only half an ear, in case they said something that would upset him. He'd already had two attacks in the past hour, and he was mentally exhausted. Nothing would have pleased him more than going home, where he could be alone with his thoughts and his music, but he also wasn't quite ready to leave his new friend.

As solitary as he chose to stay, the self-imposed isolation was a necessity, not a preference. He was too dangerous to be around others and he knew it, but that didn't mean that he didn't enjoy the company or – as he was recently discovering – the friendship. But he simply couldn't trust himself.

April was different, though. She knew, without having to ask, the horrors of what he had endured. Her unique power gave her an intuition about what calmed or upset him, and for the first time he found somebody he felt safe about being around. If he blacked out, she could bring him back, and she wouldn't shy away from him afterward.

The cup of tea Splinter gave him felt miniscule in his hands, but it warmed him still. He heard the conversation draw to a close in the other room at April's announcement, and braced himself for company. He had mixed feelings about the girl staying with the strange family. If he were honest with himself, he knew it was for the best – she was sick and injured, and would receive better care, as well as more adequate food and resources, with the turtles and their father than with him. None of them were liable to bite her head off, either.

But…

Honesty was truly one of his strong suits, no matter how much he disliked it sometimes.

If he were honest with himself, he wanted her to take the risks and stay with him. Her arrival had been sudden, her circumstances horrifyingly familiar, and the hour that followed had shaken him. But she clung to him, even when she'd seen what he was, and hadn't let him push her away even if it was for her own good. She'd stood up for him, when he had only ever protected himself.

If he were honest with himself, he was already scared of being alone again after knowing such a friend, even if only for a few short days. Her illness had terrified him, and he was scared, scared that she'd prefer the family over him, forget him and leave him to his solitary subway car.

Warm fingers, thin but strong, woke him out of his musing, rubbing against his shoulder.

"Hey."

By the sound of her voice he knew she was smiling at him, but he didn't look up.

"I suppose it is time to take my leave," he asked, setting the tiny teacup on the floor. April's fingers squeezed his shoulder, as best they could with his thick scales.

"You don't have to, you know," she said quietly. "They're nearly tripping to do whatever I want now. I could probably get them to let you stay here if I give them the pink jerks' wifi password."

He didn't know what that was, but he knew the words were sincere. April fed him threads of her intent, her trust and gratitude for him, as if she knew that he was hungry for any shred of affection he could grasp. He slowly stood up and the hand left a patch of cold when it fell away.

"My acquaintance with the turtles is not such that I could remain without overstaying my welcome," he said softly, finally looking at her. "It would be best if I left."  
April pressed her lips together, hugging her arms around herself and coughing gently.

"I'll come see you tomorrow, then," she said.

"No. I have traps set in every tunnel around my home," he said firmly. "I may come again, but you cannot come to me."

"I'm good at traps," said April with a small smirk. He stepped forward in an attempt to intimidate her, but she just smiled, staying exactly where she stood. He bent down instead, leaning his too-long snout at her face.

"So am I," he said pointedly. "Please do not seek me out. You _will_ be killed."

"Come visit tomorrow," April simply replied. "Or else I'll try."

He straightened up and examined her. She was pale, coughing under her breath, hunched with her arms pressed over the wounds on her stomach, but she stared at him steadily. He didn't doubt her word.

"I promise," he said.

Expecting another sarcastic reply, he was surprised to find her matchstick body pressed against his front. She was warm with fever, and as he tentatively wrapped his arms over her and felt her nuzzle into his chest he was reminded that she was just as alone and scared as he was.

The trip back to his subway car, the twists and turns and careful footsteps through his traps, felt longer with the sudden absence of the girl's presence, and he curled up amid his candles and scavenged comforts without sleeping for several hours.

* * *

I have the feeling that these two are going to get so sweet it'll give me cavities.

I understand having a need for affection, but also an aversion for it: I don't even like hugs from my own mother, but I get so touch-starved I'll hug warm pizza boxes and once found myself nuzzling a _wall_. The brief time that I had a boyfriend in college introduced me to how immensely comfortable it was to cuddle with someone else, and I want to introduce this here.

I'll reiterate that this is not a shipping fic. I don't think I'll even do Apritello or Raphril, even though I like both. It'll just complicate the fic and bring unneeded tension. So Leatherhead and April will definitely be close, but not shipped. You actually _can_ be affectionate and cuddly without being in a relationship.


	6. Chapter 6

She was set up in the turtles' home with a minimum of fuss and a maximum of awkwardness. Donatello had wanted to keep her in his lab for 'observation' of her illness and injuries, but neither Splinter nor Raphael were having that, for different reasons. Splinter was of the mind that a human in their lair could cause enough trouble but April herself even _more_ , simply by dint of being a teenage girl. Raphael just hated her guts and didn't want her anywhere near his brother.

A cot with three legs and a cinderblock was put in some sort of storage room, which was roomy and quiet but only had the one exit. April had gotten up in the middle of her first night to find Raphael huddled in the hall outside her door like some grumpy green watchdog.

"Where're you goin'," he muttered. She was impressed at how he managed to sound both exhausted and confrontational at the same time, but she was feeling too shitty to really work up a proper snark.

"I'm sneaking out to slit your brothers' throats while they're asleep," April deadpanned. Raphael scowled at her, obviously having expected her to be defensive.

"Wouldn't put it past you," he said.

April coughed and swept past him.

"Whatever. I have to pee. If I find you standing outside of _that_ door I'm gonna kick you in the face."

Raphael was gone by the time April got back to the storage room, but a quick mental scan indicated that he was only out of sight, hiding above her in the darkness of the high ceiling. April rolled her eyes but gave no indication that night, or the following nights, that she knew of his presence.

The first week was a dragging torture, made from pneumonia and distrust. At first they hadn't had anything for her to eat: one look at the Worms N' Algae Surprise made April feel more nauseas than she was already, so they had to restock on rice and soups, easy things that she could digest without throwing it back up. The cans and packages were often dented or dirty and April refused to look at the expiration dates, knowing that the family was doing the best they could.

She could tell that the medicines Donatello were giving her were experimental and mostly made up as he went along. One gave her chills, the next a fever, the next was _just right_ but she was twitchy for two days and the next made her so lazy that she didn't even have the energy to hug her alligator when he visited. It happened somewhere in the middle of one medication's night sweats and copious vomiting, but at some point in time Donatello and April's friend managed to come into enough agreement that they were working together on the medicine, and by the end of the week April was already feeling better enough that she couldn't pretend to cough her way out of an awkward conversation. She wondered if the concoctions made for her didn't always work as expected because of her Kraang DNA, but she wasn't ready to admit to that yet. With her friend over most days, it was something she knew she'd have to share eventually, but she was still hesitant.

"We need to come up with a name for you," she said one evening, bundled up in the lab while her friend closely monitored a centrifuge. Raphael was a constant, exhausted presence, just out of their sight.

"Mikey was good with names," chirped Donatello. He peered around the side of his Frankenstein computer, squinting at April's friend.

"He'd probably come up with a name like 'Headleather' or something," he said. "He gets really shirty when someone else does the naming."

April noticed that everyone in the lair was careful to use the present tense when referring to their missing brother, as if doing otherwise was a guarantee that they would never get him back. Donatello and Splinter were the most open ones about Michelangelo, as well as the most hopeful, but the other two turtles could barely say his name. Raphael was all _rage-worry-terror_ when Michelangelo was mentioned, but all April could feel from Leonardo was guilt. Based on the snippets she picked up, Michelangelo had been taken during what had been a routine vigilante mission for them, captured by the same ninja gang that had taken April. Nobody had done anything wrong, nobody had messed up and led to the capture of their brother, it had just happened, but Leo radiated guilt and shame, even if none of the others – not even Raphael – blamed him.

She learned this insight when she started working with him to plan the rescue mission, between bouts of nausea and naps. There was no way onto the ship without going through the Kraang's New York headquarters at TCRI, where a very small portal had been set up, the only portal the Kraang could manage since apparently her alligator friend had stolen an important power cell in the middle of his escape. The turtles, to April's amazement, actually had some sort of aerial machine built, but it was half-crashed, the struts bent or broken, the fans torn apart, two of the seats ripped out completely. Repairing it would take longer than anyone was prepared for, and so they set their sights on the portal at TCRI.

Which, unfortunately, was guarded by a host of Kraang, legions of droids, several of the weird butt-cannon ape things, various human allies, and possibly some ninjas.

April would have _loved_ to mentally rip her way through all of them, but it had taken her two months to be able to sneak into the Hive Mind without detection, and even now getting a good read on someone completely depended on her state of mind, _their_ state of mind, the connection she had with the person, how sick or tired she was, etc. She hadn't known about her powers for long at all, and she was too sick to use her energy to try and explore them much further. She's gotten past most of Donatello's firewalls in the week it took her to even begin to get better but she still had to find out the wifi password the old-fashioned way.

Her alligator helped her, when she had time with him. Because her injuries were still healing, they couldn't go back to his home, but they were secluded enough in April's 'room' that she could practice her powers with him.

She smirked at the thought of her dad's reaction to the first boy in her room being a giant mutated alligator. If – when – she ever found him, she'd enjoy telling him that.

"So, are you getting anything?"  
Her alligator peered up at her hands pressing against his temples, a lengthy exhale ruffling her bangs.

"Nothing. Perhaps it is simply not within the parameters of your power?"

April scrunched up her face.

"I don't know," she muttered. "It's not like they had a list of what was supposed to go on in my head. But I could read _their_ minds. And I could send stuff to their _computers_ , I don't know why I shouldn't be able to…"

She pressed her hands until they shook, glaring closely at his left eye.  
"Send. You... _anything?_ "

He shook his head, making her sway side to side so that she dropped her serious face and giggled.

"Not yet. Do not tire yourself, my friend."

"I'm fine, big guy."  
"You're bleeding."

Ah. So that's why her chest was hurting more than usual.

"Just a bit. Stop _worrying_ about me," April said, although she honestly enjoyed it. Her dad had always been loving, but not exactly attentive. If she told him that everything was fine, he'd believe it and get back to whatever patient file or essay he was working on. It was nice to have someone actually be concerned about her and her alone.

Her friend lifted up his head and April was forced to let go, dropping lightly onto the ground. Even sitting he still towered over her, but his immense mass was more comforting than intimidating.

He'd visited every day but the first, when he was still stuck on the idea of keeping her at a distance for her own safety – as April found out when she stomped, bleeding and coughing and feverish, out of the ghost station and down whichever tunnels seemed familiar. She'd yelled herself hoarse until she'd stepped on a loose stone and was almost impaled by a sharpened two-by-four before her giant friend grabbed her and knocked the board away. He was since there every afternoon unless he specifically said that he needed to get food or supplies. April didn't actually want to keep him prisoner, but she'd trip every trap he set before she let him isolate himself again.

There honestly wasn't much to do underground, stumbling around sick while trying to come up with a break-in plan, so April tended to stay in the lab and watch as her friend and Donatello geeked out together. Once they got over the whole 'face-grabbing' thing everybody always avoided explaining to her, the two actually found they had a good deal in common, at least in terms of engineering and science. April caught a few things here and there, but her A-plus in chemistry only took her so far in the presence of two actual geniuses. She spent her time covertly testing Donatello's electrical systems and napping, which made both scientists happy.

April almost always woke up back in her own cot, with her friend on the floor either tinkering with something or curled up in sleep.

It was on one such afternoons that April finally decided to tell him the last of her secrets, after waking up to his surprisingly quiet snores. She wrapped her blanket around herself and slipped down off the cot, then noisily walked over to him. She knew the moment he was on the edge of waking up, and slid underneath one of his arms, the movement just enough to slip him from sleep. He curled up further, pulling her under his throat, where a rumble vibrated against her back. She felt warm and protected, and she took a moment to savor it. Amid the chaos of being kidnapped, experimented on, and nearly knocked down by illness and infection, her weird reptilian friend had been her one solid pillar through every crazy, miserable day, and if April were entirely honest with herself she was terrified that he would react badly to the truth about her genetic history.

But there was nothing for it. April hated keeping secrets from her friends, and family was even worse. Her alligator counted as both.

"Big guy, I…"

April bit her lip, wondering if she should step back a bit. She stared hard at his scaly arm, everything she had practiced falling out of her mind.

"There's something I need to tell you. With everything you've been through I kinda figures it's fair, before…"  
She couldn't say 'before we become good friends.' They were already good friends. The connection they had was born of pain and healing, and it wasn't an easy thing to break. But April was still scared. What if he did leave? She honestly wasn't sure if she could handle everything without his support.

"I found out when I hacked into _their_ computers, I didn't mean to keep it a secret – "

 _Liar._

"But I…anyway, you have a right to know."  
"My friend…"

She looked up at him as he turned one side of his head toward her and peered with a beady green eye.

" _They've_ been experimenting on my family for generations," she whispered. "I'm just a little over _half_ Pink Blobby Bastard."

He exhaled, and the warm breath made her bangs fly away from her face.

"April, I know."

 _Oh, God, thank goodness._

"You knew?"  
In explanation, he leaned down a few inches and pressed the tip of his snout to the crown of her head.

 _He'd smelled it._

He probably had known the moment he'd pulled her from the river. He'd known she was part Kraang and he'd still held her while she cried, helped her dig out her trackers and heal her wounds, both physical and mental.

April pulled back a little bit and looked up at the soft, dorky little smile he was giving her. She loved her alligator so much.

"I had a whole speech planned," she said sternly. "There were tears. It was very dramatic."

"I apologize for ruining it," he replied, and pulled her into his arms.

She only noticed that she was shivering when she was pressed against his chest, and they stayed in the embrace for a long time, until Raphael knocked on her door and announced the call for dinner.

"Will you help me tell them?"

April uncurled from her friend's side but didn't let go of his wide arm.

"If we're attacking the base, I'm going to have to use my powers," she explained quietly. "I'd rather them know about everything now than have them find out and panic in the middle of things."  
"Of course I will help you," said her friend, as she had known he would. April felt a warm, soothing rush of affection for her alligator friend, and couldn't help but smile at him. She wasn't sure what exactly she had done to deserve such a wonderful companion, someone so kind and supportive, but she wasn't going to give him up for anything. She tucked her tiny hand into his huge claws and bumped her head against his chest again. She'd never felt safer or more supportive in her life than when she was around him, and April wished she had a way to express it.

"Ah, now…" her friend suddenly murmured. He hesitated before carefully putting a hand on her back, crossing his snout over her shoulders. She felt a landslide of affection falling into her head, and when she turned it around and sent it back, she knew that he felt it.

" _There_ it is."

* * *

I know the 2012!LH is not a scientist as 2003!LH is, but he's not only angst and teeth and a loving bromance with Michelangelo. The traps he set around his home were deadly, clever, and resourceful, and if the boys hadn't been ninjas they would have been dead. He even made himself a little metal alligator toy, so he's obviously good with his hands as well as highly ingenuitive. Yes I know that's not a word, spell-check, stop telling me how to live my life.

This was a big part of the friendship I had planned for, with April being like 'Hey, I'm part Kraang and I know you hate everything Kraang so I wanted you to know before we got too attached' and LH would be like 'Not even the Kraang can shit on our bromance'. I wanted it to be sweet and sappy so here you go..

Cuddling actually helps build emotional attachments, as does sleeping with each other. Just sleeping, no sexy stuff. I'm typically a pretty isolated person; very introverted, don't have any friends, don't go out, don't like to be touched – so I'm more or less using these two to get my tiny little yearly cuddle quota. These two are going to be so saccharine it'll give you cavities.


End file.
